Week 6

Week 6 Lesson Objectives

listen to the speaker with respect and let them speak without interruption

WORKING TOWARDS UNDERSTANDING THE KEY CONCEPT

light and sound are produced by a range of sources and can be sensed

What we did in class

This week, we continued learning about how sound and light travels and compared the differences between them. To help us visualise soundwaves, which we can't see, we talked about throwing a little rock into a lake. When the rock hits the surface, it pushes the water in that place out to make a little wave, when that little wave goes down it pushes the water next to it into a wave. This continues until there is no more momentum left in the waves and they fade away.

Sound waves are like ripples on a lake. They start at the sound with vibrations and then spread out through the areas around it, pushing the particles in pressure waves as it goes.

We also had fun doing some role plays to experience what it is like to be a sound wave! 6 of us stood in a row holding hands, the first person had a drum and was the sound maker. The sound maker hit the drum and then shook his hand. The second person (a sound wave) felt the shake and then passed it to the next sound wave by shaking her other hand. The vibrations continued down the line until it reached the last person who was the ear. When the ear felt the soundwave shake his hand, he held the ear up in the air. This activity demonstrated how sound travels through vibrations called soundwaves.

Then we compared sound and light. Light can travel super doper fast, way faster than sound can! Light can even travel through space. The light from the sun only takes 8 minutes to reach the Earth. Light travels so fast that when we turn on a light, it makes light immediately and we can see straight away. You can tell that light is faster than sound when there is a storm. You always see the lightning first and then the thunder sound can come several minutes later, depending on how far away the storm is.

We role played the speed of light too. 5 people stood in a row. The first person had a torch, the next 3 people had straight arrows and the last person was the eye. When the torch was turned on, the arrows and the eye were all held up quickly into the air. This showed us how quickly sound travels and that it travels in straight lines. Mrs Marini said light is actually straight wavy lines, but we don't really learn about that part until grade 5!

Afterwards, we draw our representations of sound and light traveling. This time Mrs Marini didn't show us how to draw the sound waves or the ray arrows, we had to do it ourselves.

Literacies of Science

ROLE-PLAY

Why do we use a role-play?We use a role-play to show how something works by acting it out.What does a role-play include?A role-play includes speech, actions and props.